The Foundations of a great youth group

First off I want to make sure every thing's clear here about my youth group situation. First I've been going to "Oasis" since 6th grade (it starts at 6th grade) and I've been going to Oasis's church my whole life. I've been going to "Lifeguards" since October of my sophomore year in high school (I'm a junior now) and we've just started attending the lifeguard church recently. Oasis is a much smaller youth group but we all know each other really well. While Lifeguards is a way bigger youth group that's fun but I don't know the people as well. In my years of experience of youth groups I'm going to tell you what are some of the major (and minor) foundations of a great youth group.



Great Youth Pastor/Leader:
It all really starts with this guy. If he makes youth group fun but you don't learn anything about God the parents are going to get mad at him. But on the other hand if he doesn't make youth group fun then the kids won't come! This guy has got to have a lot of patients with teens because he's going to be a prime target for pranks and jokes.



The "Hugger":
These people are usually older girls who will talk to you even if you're new. These people are ESSENTIAL for growing your youth group because new people can always rely on them to keep them from being left out. These people are always happy no matter what, and while it's kind of creepy at times you know they are a solid foot hold for you.


The Crazy Freak:
This guy does stuff that not many people would do even if they got paid! Like go put on a fake beard, wear shorts outside when it's 5 degrees out etc. This guy keeps the youth group alive and alert. This guy usually doesn't get too embarrassed easily and he always can make people smile.


The Prankster:
This guy/girl will learn where people are and their habits. It's a good idea to keep your eye out of this fella because sooner or later the prankster is gonna get you. If your new to the youth group be sure to find this person and make sure you hang out with him because the sooner you're pranked the faster you're accepted in the group.


The Best Friends:
These people are usually in the same "category" in this list if they're best friends. Like for my friend Mike and I we were partners in crime. These friends usually have each other's back when at a youth event or something similar. If you're new don't try to squeeze you're self into one of these groups right away or you'll be shunned.


The Flirt/Gossip chick:
As much as these girls may bug you they do seem to spice it up at youth group. These people are the one's who get all the guys numbers at retreats or trips. These people do get in a lot of drama though so be careful not to spill any info to these girls who will tell all.


The Comedian:
This guy is the funniest person in the youth group. Everyone stops what they're doing to hear what this guy says because it's probably going to be funny. This guy usually lives on energy drinks to keep him crazy in our case it was red bull.


Mr Jeckle and Hyde:
This kind of person is extremely rare I only know one person that fits under this category. His name is Donny he seems really normal just a funny guy. Then if there's an event that's an over niter watch out! He turns into some creature that talks to himself, grabs you in the dark, and loves to collect shoes. This person really maximizes the fun on trips.


The Spiritual guru:
This person seems to always be on a complete spiritual level higher then everyone. This person tends to be a pastors kid and pray for like 20 minutes straight. People wonder how this person can be so close to God. While sometimes these people can be a little stiff when it comes to being crazy in the church but they have good intentions.


The short girl:
This girl usually is pretty use to being called short so she is okay with people joking around about it. Which is good because the guys usually do this to it's full extent. Now if this girl is gorgeous and single she better watch out for the guys, because they're gonna be coming.


The Sports Fanatic
This person is almost always busy with some kind of sport. They are good at just about every sport invented and are usually very competitive. For Oasis this actually is the same girl that's the "short girl". She plays field hockey, basketball, and softball. No matter who this is you definitely want this person on your team for games.


The Bear
This is usually a guy and is bigger than the rest of the group. If there's a broken bone among the group then this guy is almost always part of it. This guy is hopefully not (for the small people of the group) also the "Crazy Freak" who will hurt people in ways you wouldn't expect, sadly that's not the case for Oasis.


The cocky freshman
Even though in a youth group it's not really recommended to beat up some freshmen it sometimes must be done. This is usually done by the upper class men to "break in" the freshmen and teach them that they aren't on the top of the todem pole.

If you can think of some more leave a comment and I'll update it.

Wow this really is a fierce hot mess!

If you're friends with me on facebook you probably know that I'm sick with a bad cold and I'm extremely sore. I got sick from my brother, I didn't take any precautions like, running for cover when he coughs, thinking that my immune system would kick germ butt....my immune system failed me. I've had a hard time talking normally, breathing well, and not sneezing my brains out. Now as for my being sore, I worked out at the civic center even though I was sick it wasn't too bad. I hit a lot of the machines like the pull downs, the priest curls, triceps push, etc. I worked out for about 45 minutes, because I didn't feel like doing cardio when I was sick.

Now don't think I'm sore because I don't workout. I do workout quite often, it's just that I don't have that great of stuff to work with. I workout in my basement at 10pm for crying out loud! The main muscles that I work out in my basement were my biceps and pectorals. It is pretty easy to workout my biceps, because my weights are perfect for arm muscles because they only go up to 40 lbs each. The pectorals are harder to workout due to their strength I can't bench with 80 lbs that's too easy so I'll do 300 push ups or butterflies.

So I'm really sore in my back and triceps my biceps are completely fine but my pecs hurt a little bit. So if you've been wondering about the title of this post, I'll attempt to have it appear to make sense. I had a fierce workout, I was really hot after the workout, and in the morning I was a boogery mess.

I dont have a name for this one....

the yawn technique is just like this except you flex your arms

You may have not known this about me, but I really enjoy working out despite not being able to play football anymore. I just like spending my time at least constructively growing my muscles and at the same time the ladies like the guns! Well I've got 2 dumbbells and enough weights for there to be 40 lbs on each one. The dumbbells are adjustable, which really helps when I want to mix it up between 50 reps of 25 or 15 reps of 40. I try to workout every other day but usually I miss one day or so per week. The main muscles that I workout are my pecs, abs, and biceps. I don't usually workout my legs much if at all because it's not like I can go to a girl, flex my leg, and ask her if she wants to touch. It was really hard to get motivated when I found out that I couldn't play football anymore but it's okay now because all I do is imagine how my "yawn" technique is going to leave the girls wanting more haha.





Well lately I've been kinda slacking just because I wasn't really motivated because I got the winter blues. Luckily my dad is going to get my family a membership to the civic center which has everything! All these different kinds of workout machines, a track, a basketball court, a pool and a rock climbing wall. I'm really pumped for this because I can't wait to be able to just go in there with no distractions and workout!

I've been framed!!

This semester, I was really surprised to have the choice to sit next to a really good friend of mine from lifeguards: Andrew. We both sit in the back away from Mrs S and it's a split class so he's in Spanish 8 while I'm in Spanish 6. So if I'm ever stuck he'll help me out with stupid translations which is just busy work. But the kids in Spanish 8 don't really have anything to do so he gets bored and starts throwing stuff (most of the time my stuff) at the people in front of us. They happen to be the group that I sat next to last semester so they know me pretty well. Sadly I have obtained the rep that I throw stuff at people - like erasers and pieces of paper. Yesterday Andrew was really bored so he just started chucking my stuff at Rory and Emily, who happened to be my prime targets last semester.

The first time he did it I didn't even see him do it because I was writing stuff down but then I heard a "ping" so I looked up. It happened to be the worst timing because Andrew was looking at me and I was looking at them so they started chucking stuff at me! Well, after they ran out of "ammo" things got kinda quiet but then Andrew saw my pencil. He nearly cut Emily's ear off in throwing it, and Rory... actually didn't throw it back she kept it because she likes keeping my pencils. She probably has like 4 of mine! After a while, Andrew got a hold of some of those heart-shaped candies that taste like crap and started throwing them at the girls! Then the girls started reading them and they happened to say "kiss me", "I want you", etc. Well they STILL thought it was me throwing them so they started saying "Connor I never knew you felt this way about me".

Well, the joke is on them! They are so stupid I didn't even throw one thing while they (for some reason) still believed that it was me! I didn't really care too much that I was framed because I probably would've done it myself if it wasn't for Andrew. I'm getting some ammo for today so it should be awesome I'll have my revenge!!

Can I be the first to say that I'm for the "Commercials with guys wearing pants!"

Well I know it's been like 3 weeks since the super bowl but I've been righting about spring hill. But was I the only one who was a bit disappointed with the commercials? Yes I have to admit that I really liked some but it was all squandered by these really gay ones that had guys in they're underwear! One was about some job's casual Friday taken to the next level and the other was about free pants! I was very disturbed by these commercials! It made me forget about the few good "Doritos" and "beer" commercials! Seriously there's nothing funny about guys walking in their underwear! Well besides for being scared for life, I still am freaking out, are the funny commercials for the super bowl going to turn into the fat guys in tighty whiteys commercials?? As for my favorite commercials they are the troy Palomalu and the dog with the shock collar commercials.

Wow I'm stupid!

On an average weekday with school, I get about 9 hours of sleep but for some reason when I get school off I get like 7 hours of sleep! I think it's probably because I don't want to sleep my break away. This week we had Monday- Wednesday off and until Wednesday, I would take a nap in the middle of the day. That is until yesterday where I decided I wasn't going to nap, well lets just say it sucks because I have to resist passing out typing this out right now. Luckily we only have Thursday and Friday this week so I believe that I'll be able to survive. Don't be like me, sleep in when you have the day off!

Spring Hill Sunday (3 of 3)

I was tired after getting no sleep

Really Fun Morning!

Well I'm pretty bummed at this time because this is our last day, my phone broke, and I miss being the most recognizable person that people are with. Well it started off really good because us guys ended up banging on the window of the girl's cabin. It was really funny because Carson, being a freshman, was going all stealth here and trying to come up with hand signals and what not. Then it got even better when we were at breakfast and this cute girl (lets call her Bridget) went up to me and asked "Hey you're the guy who wears the beard right?"(I didn't have the beard on) I said that I was and then she asked "My table wanted to know if it was like a bunch of stickers or marker, which is it?" Then I told her that it was eye black. After I put the beard back on it seemed like no one had seen my beard at all that weekend, because all of these girls were taking pictures of me or with me! I loved it! Then when we had session that morning I saw "Bridget" smiled at her, and then pointed to beard and asked "You like?" then Bridget responded by saying "Oh yeah I do!"

Why me!?!?!?!?!?!?

Well after session we had to go to our cabin to pack up. Well chances have it that while Brandon and I are going to the car with our stuff the trio of girls show up... and they didn't forget about yesterday. "Connie poo!" They yelled to my horror! I pretended there was some other Connie poo but sadly there wasn't! Brandon turned toward me like "Dude? Why are they calling you Connie poo?" Well I just took it like a man by pretending to not know who they were talking to until they came close enough where I could whisper "hi" to them. Sadly that was the last time I saw them, but on the other hand the girls from my youth group didn't know about it. Oh and If I didn't break my phone that morning I totally would've gotten their numbers, but of course with my luck I end up with no numbers!

I will never understand girls

Well Joy, Melissa and Marisa have been flirting with guys all weekend trying to get some digits and until this point have got nothing! Until this one guy Hunter comes and starts talking to them and then after like talking to him 10 minutes, he gets all 3 of their numbers!! I would suggest to them to just do my strategy of finding a group of people and spend the whole weekend to get to know them, but then again how many numbers did I get? Oh yeah that's right I got none, while they each got one! Seriously I really need to work on getting girls numbers that I spend a week/ weekend with because I'm 0-4 while the girls are like 3-0!

Lunch time!

Well after looking for the trio of girls again it was time for lunch. While I was walking by this girl I'm walking next to yells "What's that on your face??" Now, I'm kinda confused because it's not like I just decided to put this fake beard on this morning or anything. I've been wearing it all weekend! I just say "Why? It's just a beard" Then she was pretty confused too. Well after a while Hunter comes over to our table to flirt with the girls. And get this! He thought my beard was REAL! Way to pick, joy and Company! Yeah well after grabbing some lunch, we got in the cars and set out to leave.

McDonalds where the whack jobs go

Well after a nothing special drive halfway from home we go to McDonalds. Now this is before I've washed off my beard, and it really got annoying not being able to touch my face. So the first thing I do is go to the bathroom so that I can wash off the beard. But to do this I had to pass the employees. Well lets just say some people were staring at me and some little kid was all eyes! After washing it off Hannah and Brandon had me wash it again, because they said I missed some! Well I seriously couldn't see anything but I did and I ended up washing my face like 5 times! To this day I still think they were lying so that my face would be super dry!

After thoughts

Well I hope you enjoyed this story about Spring Hill as much as I loved living it out. I'm really glad that Carson came, because I truly believe that if it wasn't for him I totally would've spent my whole weekend with the girls. Which would've been fun but not helpful in the long run! And I'm really glad that people brought friends like Melissa, Collette, and Brice. If you didn't know before, I actually had a choice to either go with oasis or lifeguards. Even though people tried to pressure me to go with lifeguards because they had more guys, I still would 100% go with Oasis!
I also was this crazy in honor of our old youth pastor Alex, who wore a unibrow all of Saturday last year. My only regrets are that I didn't get those girls numbers and never even let them call me "Connie poo" once! Oh and funniest moment besides all of the reactions to people seeing my beard is when Adriel (youth leader) said that I was an inspiration for not caring what people thought and wearing a beard anyway!

Spring Hill Day 2 (out of 3)

group picture of team "Waldo!"

doing an Alex pose

Breakfast

Well after getting only 4 hours of sleep I woke up. We were to meet the girls at 7:40 in the breakfast building. It was fun to see people's reactions when I walked by them without my beard, because they would do a double take! A lot of the girls that had talked to me about my beard were in shock that I took it off or were amazed to see my face without the beard. The 3 girls were some of the people that were shocked to see me without my beard. They asked "Hey Connor where's your beard?" I responded by saying that I'd put it on as soon as possible.

The great unibrow
We had broom ball after breakfast so we decided to put on our war paint! I had a unibrow because our youth pastor Alex had one last year and I also had a line going down my nose all for broom ball! Surprisingly we won after going 0-2 the last couple of years we won 2-1 in overtime! After broom ball we had a game show that we had to go to. It was a quiz theme, I was selected to go up and represent the black team! Now at first I couldn't really understand why this girl next to me was acting scared of me, then I remembered the war paint and how I had a unibrow! We selected the subject "texting" and wow I text a lot but I never even heard of half of these!! I couldn't get a break! We won that subject despite me not knowing half of them haha. We ended up winning it all at the game show which keeps my perfect record of 3-0!

"Looking for people"
Well being a bearded guy and having 3 girls totally into me even with it on! I totally had to hang out with them again. I would tell Carson that we were "looking for people" which insisted that we were looking for members of oasis, but I wasn't. What I was looking for were those girls, and I'm pretty sure he knew it. They had kind of a "hangout area" in the game room so of course that's where we were headed to most of the time! Well after looking for them a while we had a session which was fun but I honestly wanted to get out of there to have some FUN!!!


Wow I LOVE this place!!!
Well after session Brandon (our chaperon), Carson, and I went to our cabin to gather our stuff so we could go tubing! Well on the way, we went past about 15 girls among them were the 3 girls and all of the girls said "Hey Connor!" and at first I was really confused, like how would these girls know me? After a long time I found out that they were all in one youth group and that the 3 girls were talking about me to them and said that I was the guy with the beard/unibrow! After they passed I said "Wow I wished we never had to go home!".


The way tubing SHOULD be done!
Well after the shock of 15-20 girls knowing me without me saying a word to them, settled in I went tubing for 2 straight hours! It was fun but then I thought of something to make tubing WAY more fun! A lot of people like to tie their tubes together so they have a big group going down together! Well my plan was to wait for a group then after they started going I'd go down in hot pursuit of them! When I got close enough I'd try to grab on some one's leg or tube then I'd climb on in with their group! My target were mainly cute girls. I loved doing this because I got to meet a whole lot of new people this way and it also scared the crap out of them! Well after 2 hours I got tired of going up the hill so I went to the cabin to just spend sometime with myself. That time with my self lasted a whole 10 minutes. The reason it only lasted that long because I was like ahh I love relaxing, then I thought "Oh crap! I only get one weekend here and I'm not going to waste it relaxing!". So I went running to the game room to umm..."look for people"


Fun with the ladies
Well I actually washed the unibrow off after I got to the game room, and Carson was with me because he saw me running to look for people*. Well we did find the girls but they were with their whole youth group and they had a guy bigger than me so I stayed my distance and play cards. We soon got bored of playing cards so we decided to go back to the tubing hill. I think the girls saw us go to the hill, because shortly after we got there they were there too. Well we all had a lot of fun together, even though I wasn't aloud to grab one of the girls legs because "she would pee her pants" and I didn't want to get pee on me. I actually have to admit that the girls Erin, Becca and Dayah really know how to keep it interesting for a bearded guy.

*cute girls that adore guys in fake beards


Broomball numba 2
After totally unleashing my endless charm, we had another broom ball game. I finally got bearded for battle thanks to Sarah G. I was actually kinda missing my beard because it really helped me meet girls and plus it was priceless to see everyone expressions. Well the ice had been broken after a couple of games so it was mainly cold water on concrete which was lame! Our team only has 2 guys and like 13 girls but it was the opposite for the other team. They had 10 guys and 2 girls, AND all of the guys were my size or bigger! We lost 4-0, we forfeited in the 3rd quarter. After we were all frozen, literally my hair, and pants were actually frozen. Well after I chipped the ice off my pants I went in the game room with Carson and played some card games.


Bye bye pride I wish I still had you
Well nothing really happened the rest of the day until about 10 pm. When I was on my way to the tubing hill the Erin, Becca, and Dayah saw me and then decided that they were gonna call me "conniepoo". Yup I lost all of my pride the day they thought of that. Well anyway we went to the tubing hill and I saw a bunch of my friends and decide to grab on them as they were going down. But they didn't tell me that they were battling on the tubes! I was thrown off without really knowing what in the world was going on... then came Carson. Carson didn't go as early as me and so I was on my stomache, laying down, with legs towards the hill! Then *WHAM* he hit me in between the legs he didn't nail my "man hood" but he did get my very inflexable groin to stretch...a lot! Stagering up I found myself nearly hit AGAIN with a 3rd wave of tubes! Luckily I limp with the agility of a guy who nearly felt the worse pain possible -that God made for his own entertainment-. After than I fell on my bed and I thought "well the day could've ended better than being called conniepoo and stretched too far."

Spring Hill day 1 (out of 3 days)

At the Gas station where Sarah G put on my beard!

Well last year at spring hill we were Britains. This year we were the war paint and dude with the cool fake beard youth group. Well as I said before, I did go all out with the paint! I had the "beard" on for most of the weekend. Ok well I'm going to start from the beginning...

Originally, the plan was from Liz, Lj, and Collette to put on my beard, but that changed when Sarah G wanted to do it, then we stopped at a gas station! First we were just going to put the goatee on but that soon changed as soon as the suggestion of sideburns began! So as soon Sarah G was finished with my beard, I went outside of the car to show the other 2 cars!

After we arrived at Spring Hill we were in front of an auditorium trying to figure out what to do then that's when these 3 girls came. "Do you guys know how to play big booty?" said one of them and we said we use to but kinda forgot. They really thought my beard was funny and were complimenting it pretty often. So after we were almost done learning big booty, this HUGE gust of cold wind came and we ran for cover in the game room. So in successfully surviving the wind Carson and I celebrated with a game of pool.

So after we were playing a while this guy asks if he can play pool with us so we are like yeah why not? Well after we were getting killed by this guy in pool, the same 3 girls come in and sit at a booth not too far away. I catch their eye every once in a while and I'm wondering whats up. Then I hear my name called so I turn around then the girls at the booth burst out laughing! They had remembered my name from the game of big booty and they loved the fact that they knew my name. This is when I'm finally like they like like (yes that's not a typo) me and my beard! Then they say "Hey Connor come over here!"

When I get to their booth they ask me a question which I really had a good laugh with. "What year did you graduate?" they asked and were really eager. I laughed and said that I'm a junior in high school. That's when I could tell they were really interested, because they attacked me with questions like... "where are you from?", "Are you 16 or 17?", "Do you have your license?", and "Can I see your license?". After they saw my license they were like yeah the beard definitely makes you look older. But as an older class man, I had to kinda stick with the freshman and not ditch him, so against my rules of "anything goes when it comes to a girl" I left the girls because Carson wanted to go.

After that we has session which is where everyone at camp gathers to praise God with music and etc. Well my beard again proved to be hit because several of people came to talk to me about my fake beard. Like they would be like "I really like your beard! It's not real right?" and I would respond by no and say something funny about "insta-beard". I really loved the fake beard by the end of the day! Before I went to bed I said to myself "This is going to be a great weekend!"

Spring Hill and War paint!!!

Today is the day we go to winter retreat at spring hill. I go there with my church youth group and it's always a ton of fun! There's only 3 guys going (including the chaperon), and there are at least 10 girls going... now I know what your thinking. You're feeling sorry for me without too many guys to hang with. Try to look at this from my side... There's 2 guys 1 junior (me), and 1 freshman, 4 junior girls, 4 sophomore girl, and 2 freshmen girls now you're thinking "you lucky dog".

Yeah but aside from the five girls to one guy which I really like, I've also got to tell you what we did last year. Last year we decided to pretend that one of the senior girls was blind and that we were all British. It was so funny because people would guide our "blind girl" around telling her that she can trust them. Well this year we need to top that so we've been considering this for a long time and just recently it hit me! We're going to be the war tribe!! This is going to take some explaining...

I've still got some "eye black" (stuff under football player's eyes), from football left over and we're going to draw on each others faces the whole weekend! Hopefully it all works out. I'll go all out and put some pictures up here as soon as I can!

National Signing day Version 2.0

Well out of our last 3 prospects we only got one... but it's actually a WHOLE lot more complicated than that. Michigan had a lock, a 50-50, and a we'll get him when the Detroit Lions win heading 2 days till signing day, well just so happens the "lock" broke, the luck wasn't with us and the lions WON!

We got the best of the 3 defensive backs in Demar Dorsey, and with his versatility to be either a corner back or a safety it really helps us end on a good note. Yes it's a disappointment that we didn't get Sean Parker but seriously would you rather have a 5-10 hard hitter or a 6-0 kid that runs a 4.35 in the 40? Dorsey is a huge pick up for the Blue! I really can't wait to see this guy on the field, some people even think he can be a "Charles Woodson" where he plays defense but also a bit of offense. Another thing that Dorsey brings is a swagger whether it's mentally or it's physically dancing haha he's a special guy!

After 8 decommits last year it's really nice to only have 1 this year and it was due to academics.I'm really starting to like this Rodriguez magic that happens on signing day especially since Ohio State didn't seem to have any of it this year with an 0-3 record in a week!

National Signing day!!

With today being National Signing day (high school football recruiting) there is going to be some serious amount of info on the recruiting front. With lots of twists and turns, I'll tell you all about what happened and this blog will be fully updated by this evening. Keep your eye's on these guys...

• Demar Dorsey (Red ^) Safety from Florida. It has been rumored for quite some time that Demar was going to commit to Florida State. But that changed this morning when apparently he texted his cousin Denard Robinson (Michigan football player), that he is going to commit to the wolverines! Dorsey has blazing speed with a 4.35 40-yard dash. He also might be the next Charles Woodson where he plays offense and defense.

• Sean Parker (Green ^) Safety from California. Like Demar it has been, rumored that Sean is going to be either a wolverine or go to USC, but now it seems more like Washington! Washington is making a last ditch pull for Parker and apparently it's working! I'm pretty bummed about this information because Parker is a "smash your teeth out" kind of guy where he makes bone crushing tackles.

I call this signing day a success if we get at least one of these guys. If we get both it's going to make me want to yell for joy in the streets! But I'll be yelling my brains out if we dont even get one of these guys.

Whew!

Well today Sienna and I went to Dearborn High to get our schedules and then I found out I had Spanish 6 in first hour!!! To my relief though my counselor changed it so I have it in 6th hour again! Crisis averted!